1. Field of the Invention
The present invention relates to a ring tone melody service for use with mobile phones.
2. Description of the Related Art
In recent years, mobile phones have been used as information terminal units having a function for connecting themselves to the Internet along with their original function as telephone units. As a service using the Internet, a ring tone melody distribution service has become popular. The ring tone melody distribution service allows the user to connect his or her mobile phone to a ring tone melody distribution site through the Internet and to download his or her desired ring tone melody from the site.
Normally, the user is charged for data of a ring tone melody downloaded from the ring tone melody distribution site. In addition, the storage capacity of a built-in memory of a mobile phone is not large. Thus, the user who bought many ring tone melodies should discard many of them that cannot be stored in the mobile phone. As a result, the user's expenditure will become wasteful.
To solve such a problem, a technology for compressing data of a ring tone melody and storing the compressed data has been proposed (refer to for example patent related art reference 1). In addition, a technology for storing uncompressed data of a part of a ring tone melody and reproducing it during decompressing the rest thereof has been proposed (refer to for example patent related art reference 2).
Patent Related Art Reference 1
Japanese Patent Publication No. HEI 9-16168 A
Patent Related Art Reference 2
Japanese Patent Publication No. 2002-91437 A
However, even if data is compressed, it is stored in the built-in memory of the mobile phone. Thus, when many ring tone melodies are stored or when the file sizes thereof will become large as the ring tone melody distribution service will advance, such technologies are not capable of solving the problem.